SD backing up to NAS drive via wireless router
 

Here's what I've done.

I'm running Leopard 10.5.2 on a MacBook Pro. I'm attached wirelessly to a Netgear router that is connected, in turn, by ethernet to a network printer, an old iMac, and a new LaCie NAS disk, 320gig that uses Linux and the XFS file system. It supports files over 4gig (I'm thinking of the warning in your manual).

I know I can't boot from this drive (even though SD makes it bootable). But I have used SD to create a sparse image on the LaCie drive and to do a complete back-up of the MacBook to the image. By the way, this exists side-by-side with the Time Machine sparse image.

Here's what happens.

For SD to do a Smart Update to the LaCie drive I have to 1) mount the LaCie drive and then 2) double click and mount the SD sparse image. Also, I have to tell the computer to skip the checksum routine; otherwise it seems to run forever.

If I forget to do those two (slash three) steps SD hangs, giving the message that it is trying to mount the sparse disk image, and I have to force quit it. Perhaps SD is waiting for the checksum to finish?

(I found that if I turn off the preference for SD's remembering backup location it doesn't "hang" waiting for the disk image.)

Ordinarily, the LaCie drive is mounted in any case, but SD still hangs trying to mount the sparse image over the network. Maybe it just can't be done?

I saw a long discussion in your forum devoted to a somewhat similar situation, and I, too, tried to create a script that would mount the sparse image before SD began its back-up routine. I failed at that.

There's no problem backing up so long as I remember to mount the LaCie drive and then the sparse image, skipping checksum.

But is there any way to automate this? The manual seems to say (p. 19) that once you've created the image that SD will find and mount the external volume and then the image. That does not happen. (Perhaps that applied to a Firewire-connected drive?)

I have used Onyx, Disk Utility, and TinkerTool to turn off the checksum checking. That doesn't keep (the Finder?) from doing the check.

??

If I keep force quitting SD I'm afraid I'll corrupt it!

I know I should get a Firewire drive, and I do have one, which I gave to my wife. And, of course, I can't with straight face take it back after preaching to her the virtues of back-ups.

Thanks! And again, thanks for a great program.

Alarik

Unfortunately, this "security" enhancement always scans the image... if you waited long enough, it would eventually mount. Frustrating, I know.